


Strangers

by fufaraw (arliss)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-22
Updated: 2017-04-22
Packaged: 2018-10-22 09:55:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10694616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arliss/pseuds/fufaraw
Summary: Sometimes family doesn't begin with blood





	Strangers

She couldn't see resemblance in this tall person before her to anyone in her family, or John's, that she remembered. John's dimples, of course, a hint of the cleft in her own jaw, the long arm and leg bones they shared. But he was a stranger, and no matter how mild and meek he tried to seem, an air of danger radiated off him. On the street, her instinct would have been to avoid him.

But, even though her heart found no connection, her brain acknowledged this was her son, the infant she'd held in her arms mere days ago. And she could read on that face a lifetime of pain and effort and sacrifice--John's journal had informed her of some of it. Castiel had shared even more--things she couldn't bear to think of happening to that baby boy.

It hurt to look at him and know she hadn't been there to protect him, not only from the bad things most folks don't know about, but from the ordinary hurts of life, and yes, even the implacable standards and strictures his father had forced him to live by.

She could feel the residue of all that pain and hardship, but what was worse was that he seemed to have accepted it, to carry all of it with a weary air of having earned it, deserved it. And that hurt worst of all. It scared her to face her failure to have done the least thing to protect her child, to in fact have been the agent who brought it all on him. A weight of guilt so enormous she couldn't stand being in the room with it, or with him, or with her other son, who had suffered equally, and at her hands.

But in those scarce moments when she was able to step away from that burden of guilt, and to lay aside her mourning for the young family she had lost, she could look at Sam and see someone robbed, not only of childhood, but of being treasured, his accomplishments delighted in, of a supporting parent, of a mother's love. And in those moments, she acknowledged their kinship, and made the first tentative effort to reach out to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Early season twelve, and my own wishful thinking.


End file.
